‘First their grades fall… then their behaviour changes’: How screen addiction is impacting Delhi’s young adults

The Indian Express speaks to school heads, experts and children themselves on the gravity of the crisis and how it can be managed.

‘Look for the signs’

According to Anjali Kharbanda, Principal, N K Bargodia Public School in Dwarka, it usually starts with slipping grades. “The children then withdraw from social spaces, there is a loss of interest in participating in school activities, and their behaviour changes.”

However, the drop in grades, she explains, is rarely the problem — more often, it’s a symptom.

Take the case of the 12-year-old whose struggles began long before his report card reflected them. He had stopped waking up for school, his appetite reduced, and he withdrew from friends and sports. Nights were spent in front of a screen.

When his parents brought him to Sir Ganga Ram Hospital, the diagnosis was clear: “emerging depressive features strongly linked to excessive screen use”. Treatment involved parental training, cognitive behavioural therapy “to address negative thought patterns”, a fixed digital curfew, and routines to restore sleep.

“Gradually, with better sleep and reduced screen exposure, his mood and energy levels improved, as did his school engagement,” says Dr Bhavna Barmi, senior child psychologist at Fortis Escort Heart Institute.

At the same clinic, parents of a 15-year-old girl, who was a class topper once, rushed to seek help. Their daughter was into “late-night video streaming and chatting” — until 3 or 4 am — but it soon disrupted her sleep cycle entirely. She became irritable, disengaged, and began experiencing auditory hallucinations.

Doctors diagnosed her with chronic insomnia induced by prolonged screen exposure, which had altered melatonin production and impacted her cognitive and emotional regulation. She was prescribed behavioural sleep therapy, short-term pharmacological support, and sessions to address academic anxiety and social isolation.

Other real-life instances highlight the severity of the problem and what could happen if it’s left unchecked — like in the case of this nine-year-old boy.

He regularly spent three to four hours unsupervised on a phone, flew into uncontrollable rage when it was taken away. In a moment of distress, he found a kitchen knife and slashed his arm.

His actions, doctors say, were classified as a form of behavioural addiction, mirroring withdrawal-like symptoms — “emotional dysregulation, impaired impulse control, and agitation”.

He was rushed to the emergency room at Dr Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital and later referred to the child psychiatry department. Finally, gradual device weaning, therapy to build frustration tolerance, and counselling for his parents helped address the issue.

In a similar case, a Class 4 child in Dwarka began throwing violent tantrums and using abusive language after being left unsupervised — his mother was often preoccupied with filming YouTube reels. The child, doctors say, had to be hospitalised and shifted to a new school.

The most alarming case from this year involved a 19-year-old who had been addicted to mobile gaming for more than a year. He spent over 12 hours a day on his phone, playing games like Battlegrounds Mobile India. He became sedentary, socially withdrawn, and over time developed kypho-scoliosis, a spinal deformity, worsened by undiagnosed spinal tuberculosis.

By the time he was brought to the Indian Spinal Injuries Centre, he had lost bladder control and could barely walk. Doctors performed a complex spinal surgery involving navigation, decompression, and implant stabilisation.

“They were able to reverse his bladder dysfunction and restore partial mobility within days,” says Dr Barmi.

Research from around the world also points to similar issues with screen addiction among children.

According to an international study published in June, in the medical Journal JAMA, researchers analysed screen use among 4,285 children from 10 years of age in the United States; they screened them for compulsive use and distress when denied devices.

The study found that by the age of 14, those with high addictive behaviour were two or three times more likely to have suicidal thoughts. It also found a direct link between “high and increasing addictive screen use trajectories” with “suicidal behaviours and ideation and worse mental health”.

Need for a policy

Schools, meanwhile, are grappling with how to handle screens in classrooms.

“Banning phones makes no sense at all,” says Dr Ameeta Mulla Wattal, DLF Foundation schools chairperson and former principal of Springdales School. “Many use it as a teaching and learning device. Before Covid, there were very stringent measures in place in schools. Phones were confiscated.”

But she acknowledges the dangers. She recalls an incident from Springdales a few years ago, of a teenage girl being bullied.

A mock parliament session was held at the school for her. “She stood up before her classmates and shared her story: she had been digitally bullied, her images morphed and circulated without consent.”

“She had the strength to open up,” Wattal says. “That kind of honesty doesn’t happen overnight — it takes time, and trust. We have to build those ecosystems inside schools.”

In February, the Delhi High Court, responding to a PIL, issued a set of directives for managing smartphone use in schools. It stopped short of imposing a ban, instead urging institutions to strike a balance between regulation and responsible access.

Students, the court said, should not be barred from carrying smartphones, but schools must regulate their use — encouraging safe deposit systems at entry and prohibiting devices from disrupting classrooms, school discipline, or being used in common areas and vehicles.

“Schools must educate students on responsible online behaviour, digital manners, and the ethical use of smartphones. Students must be counselled that high levels of screen-time and social media engagement can lead to anxiety, diminished attention spans and cyber-bullying,” the court stated.

While smartphones could be permitted for safety and coordination, their use for entertainment or recreational purposes should be explicitly disallowed, the order further read.

Following this, the Directorate of Education in April issued a circular to all government school heads, directing them to begin drafting institution-level smartphone usage policies. The circular acknowledged that no formal provision for managing smartphones existed in government schools.

A vice-principal of a Delhi government school, who is drafting the policy in her school, says her staff agreed to allow only basic keypad phones — enough for emergencies. “There have been several cases of misuse,” the vice-principal adds.

Children, too, have acknowledged the seriousness of the problem.

In 2022, twins Samaya and Samhara Chauhan, who study in Class XII at Pushp Vihar’s Amity International School, launched an anti-bullying initiative after seeing how mental health and cyberbullying are major concerns in their peer groups. “We realised the intensity of the issue and formed a team of four for an anti-bullying project,” says Samaya.

In 2023, their initiative evolved into PLANY — a campaign focused on girl child education, AI in classrooms, and online safety. “From the data we collected, we found that maximum cyberbullying happens in international servers on Discord (a social platform),” they say. “Strangers befriend kids and share pictures, memes…”

According to the twins, dedicated lockers for phones, structured time windows for digital use, and clear policies that promote equitable tech access without deepening the digital divide can help solve the crisis.

Expert speak

Dr Nitin Verma, Director (Paediatrics) at Madhukar Rainbow Children’s Hospital in South Delhi, says he has seen a worrying rise in suicide attempt cases in recent years among school-going children — many of them directly linked to screen addiction issues.

“We have seen at least three or four such cases in recent months,” he says. “The Covid pandemic made even younger children dependent on screens. Since classrooms have switched to a hybrid model, there are no concrete guidelines on what needs to be done.”

What troubles him most is the lack of adult supervision. “In almost 60% of cases, the child is unsupervised. Most families are nuclear… grandparents are involved in very few cases,” he adds.

He has also observed an alarming spike in obesity and emotional distress among children aged 8 to 16, both of which he links to prolonged screen exposure. “Screen usage is rampant. And when children as young as two years are exposed to screens — whether a television, tablet, or laptop — it significantly raises the risk of Autism Spectrum Disorder,” he adds.

The entry of Artificial Intelligence (AI) hasn’t helped matters. “AI has impacted students, leading to more smartphone usage,” says Pavan Duggal, a leading cyber law expert.

He cites cases of teens caught in hallucinated interactions and blurred digital boundaries — like a boy who recently asked ChatGPT how to manage his relationships.

Online trends are also deepening the problem. “Young teens had been mindlessly sharing their photos for the Ghibli trend,” he says, referring to AI mimicking Japan’s famous Studio Ghibli style of animation.

He also highlights a sharp rise in cyberbullying, trolling, stalking, and online harassment — though most cases, he says, go unreported. The silence is often rooted in stigma and fear.

“Most people who seek help don’t want to officially report the incident. Some youngsters even run anonymous confession pages on social media, which can create serious issues,” Duggal says.

Principal Kharbanda sums up the issue: “Children pick up more than we realise,” she says.

“It’s not just what they watch — it’s what they start becoming… at the cost of our neglect.”